The Sheet with Jeff Marek - On The Sheet: Anton Thun on NHL GM Searches and Front Office Hiring

Episode Date: April 8, 2026

Former NHL player agent Anton Thun joins Jeff Marek on The Sheet to break down the growing number of NHL front office vacancies and how teams approach finding the right general manager. Thun explains why certain executives succeed in specific markets, using examples like Kent Hughes with the Montreal Canadiens and Bill Armstrong with Utah/Arizona, and discusses how ownership groups evaluate leadership styles, roster vision, and organizational structure when hiring. He also reflects on the role of agents within the league ecosystem and how player development, contract value, and front office philosophy intersect across the NHL. The conversation also touches on Pavel Zacha’s breakout season with the Boston Bruins, how players often find another level in their mid-20s, and why environment and opportunity can dramatically change a player’s trajectory.Leave a voicemail: https://www.speakpipe.com/TheSheetEmail us: [e-mail] TO OUR SPONSORS!!👍🏼 Fan Duel: https://www.fanduel.com/👍🏼 Ninja: https://www.sharkninja.ca/ninja-crispi-pro-6-in-1-countertop-glass-air-fryer-rose-quartz/AS101CRS.html?utm_source=Meta&utm_medium=Paid+Social&utm_campaign=H1NinjaCrispi&utm_content=NinjaEN&dwvar_AS101CRS_color=cdb9b8Reach out to [e-mail] to connect with our Sales Team and discuss opportunities to partner with us!If you liked this, check out:🚨 OTT - Coming in Hot Sens | https://www.youtube.com/c/thewallyandmethotshow🚨 TOR - LeafsNation | https://www.youtube.com/@theleafsnation401🚨 EDM - OilersNation | https://www.youtube.com/@Oilersnationdotcom🚨 VAN - CanucksArmy | https://www.youtube.com/@Canucks_Army🚨 CGY - FlamesNation | https://www.youtube.com/@FNBarnBurner🚨 Daily Faceoff Fantasy & Betting | www.youtube.com/@DFOFantasyandBetting____________________________________________________________________________________________Connect with us on ⬇️Link Tree: https://linktr.ee/daily_faceoff💻 Website: https://www.dailyfaceoff.com🐦 Follow on twitter: https://x.com/DailyFaceoff💻 Follow on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/dailyfaceoffDaily Faceoff Merch:https://nationgear.ca/collections/daily-faceoffReach out to [e-mail] to connect with our Sales Team and discuss opportunities to partner with us! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Speaking to Pavel Zaka, he's a part of the Cortex family, as was our next guest, he is Anton Thun, former NHL player agent and someone who, as we've seen and heard before, has a number of opinions about a number of things. First of all, good to see you again, Anton. And second of all, do you have a thought on a former client from your stable, although I think Kent Hughes represented him? Pavel Zaka is having an incredible season for the Boston Bruins, 30 goals. Bulls, 64 points. Holy smokes. Yeah, hi, Jeff. And thanks for inviting me on. Listen, Pavel Azaka is a great hockey player and a great person as well.

And it's actually Paul Capizano. Oh, Cappy, okay. Yeah, Cappy works with Pavel. And yeah, you know what? He's come into his own. I think he had a tough time finding his legs in New Jersey. And the trade between Jersey and Boston was a, breath of fresh air for him. He loves Boston. Like he truly loves the city. He loves the team.

And yeah, and he's flourishing as a result of that. And you know what he's he's getting more and more responsibility there. And you know, he's like most hockey players between the ages of 24 and 30. They mature. Their game is mature. And that's exactly what's happened with Pavel. And he's become a very important player in their lineup. 4.75 million. Like a, an, absolute bargain right now. Yeah, maybe for the Boston Bruins. I think that the next deal might go up significantly from that.

I don't think you're wrong. Saving grace for the Bruins is they have one more year on term with with Zaka. Okay, so a couple of things. In specific, right now there are teams that are doing their general manager searches, as we all know, now the New Jersey Devils enter that mix. Toronto Maple Leafs got there.

Last week, Nashville has been there for a while. And as we all wonder, you know, who's it going to be? Are they going to have a poho and a general manager? What's it going to look like? What's a, you know, you've always had your thumb on the pulse for things like this. Like you're always a wonderful person to talk to around CBA issues, player issues, but also the right fit for the right team and understanding what, you know, the skill set of different candidates and why they might be the right thing for some teams and the wrong thing for other teams. teams. When you look, before we get to like Nashville and we get to the New Jersey Devils and the Toronto Maple Leafs, you know, I was mentioning off the top, you know, Kent Hughes in Montreal,

Bill Armstrong in Utah. Do you have a thought on why some managers work in some markets where others would fail? Well, listen, I think at the end of the day, the general rule across the board is you've got to put the square peg in the square hole in the round peg. And the round peg in the ground hole. And what ends up happening oftentimes is your, your hiring process might get, you know, that wrong, I guess to put it bluntly. And I'll use an example. And I think I texted you this, you know, both Kent Hughes, who's my former business partner and Bill Armstrong, who was a former client and who I continue to have a great relationship with and mentor to some extent are very bright hockey people. Very different people, though. And they took over

responsibilities in Arizona for Billy and Montreal for Kent in very, very different structures. So Bill Armstrong had a playing, coaching, scouting, assistant general manager experience before he went to Arizona. And that really helped them build out a complete team of personnel from the players on the ice, to the scouts in the room, to the assistant general managers, you know, to the rest of his team. And he was experienced enough to be able to do that. Kent Hughes, on the other hand, went into a very, very different situation in Montreal. They already had Jeff Gordon as a team president. They also had a president of business operations. They had John Cedric as the assistant general manager negotiate contracts.

And they brought in Kent for his expertise and his mind to fill a hole in terms of creating a vision for the team alongside with Jeff, Jeff Gordon. And they've done a fantastic job, obviously, and Bill Armstrong has done a fantastic job, but it's been a very different job. And I think the Nashville Predators and the New Jersey Devils and the Toronto Maple Leafs all have different job. Yes, they're hiring a general manager, but the needs that they have for what that general manager is to bring to the table are very different in all three situations. Because in Nashville, you've got an experienced team that seems to be making a run for the playoffs and they have a lot of older talent. New Jersey is a younger team that's on the up and up, but haven't been able to get there. And then you've got the Leifes who, you know, I guess we all have different. on what's going on with the Leafs.

They've got a couple superstars and a bunch of 28 to 35-year-old guys that are on their last legs. And you need to have, I guess, a direction in terms of where you're going there. I think the most important thing, quite honestly, Jeff, in a place like Toronto, because we're in this Toronto market, is that they actually have to do a better assessment than just firing Brad Trill Living, okay, because I don't think that the organization as a whole was just Brad Trillivin making mistakes, okay? It was everybody pitching in to have a dumpster fire and who are those people that were pitching in and who were the ones that had fire hoses in that dumpster

fire trying to save the Maple Leafs. So, you know, you've got obviously as the face of the franchise, Brad Trill Living, Craig Barubi, Keith Pelley. You also have four assistant general managers that you should be reviewing, okay, and deciding, are you keeping them or are they going? You also have a scouting staff that either has been very successful in finding diamonds in the rough because they haven't had first round picks or they have not been successful. So you've got to get more of a holistic picture of what you're doing rather than just going out and hiring an executive search firm to give you a list of people and have that list of people who really know nothing about your franchise from the inside out giving you solutions to the

problems that you have because it's likely that they don't understand the problems. Let me pause on that. I do want to pick up that point because I think it's an issue in this entire process. And by the way, one small mistake there, there's actually 20 million general managers of the Toronto Maple Leafs across Canada, as we all know. Yes, there's four official. Four official for getting paid, but there's really 20 million you think that they can, they can run this whole thing.

And I count that twice for all the guys from Woodbridge. Yes, exactly. Anything along Highway 7. Yes, they're all wearing two hats. I am curious to part of, you know, what makes a manager successful. And for a situation like this, that might need to be a, you know, Poho in between president of hockey operations. But I'm always curious about which managers fit with

the very unique ownership structure that different teams have. Okay, like I look at New Jersey. He's your private equity guys. I look at MLSC. It's a board. I look at Nashville. It's Bill Haslam. New owner.

Like, how much consideration do you give that when you're saying, okay, this person is going to be able to work with this board? This person is going to be able to work with the private equity guys. This is going to be able, this person is going to be able to work with the single owner in Bill Haslam. Like how much of a factor is that, Anton? Well, listen, I think it's a large factor. I don't think it's the determining factor. The reality of it is, you know, you're going to get your mandate from ownership or from a board of directors or from an individual owner.

And hopefully, you understand the wants and needs of that owner and whether he's going to meddle or he's not going to meddle and whether you have actually a mandate to solve the problem. If you don't have a mandate to solve the problem, quite honestly, I don't think you should take the job because that's what you're being hired to do. And if you're being handcuffed by ownership, you're never going to be successful. You're never going to be successful. You can be the brightest guy in the world. But if you can't make the decisions that are actually going to lead to success, don't take the job.

But do you think that, I mean, listen, this is a, a multi-billion dollar industry now and all of these, like I was talking about the new ownership class on the program yesterday, you know, the new ownership class, you know, they came to the NHL already wealthy and they've been wealthy by running their other businesses where they have two hands on the wheel. Is there not a sort of understanding that with this much on the line, that ownership is going to have a say and wants to have a say? And listen, some of these guys are, you know, shelling out like, you know, $2 billion now. They should probably have. have a say in all of this. This is,

this is their money after all. Well, Jeff, you're 100% right, but let's go back to the, the old days. You and I might remember something. I remember something. And, you know, I would hesitate to say that Jeremy Jacobs

never has a hand in anything that goes on in Boston, or that Earl Ballard never had a hand in anything that went on in Toronto or that Steve Savro never had a hand. So they all have a hand, right? The issue is, Are they controlling, like, are they actually the captains of the ship, or are they allowing you to be the captain of the ship? And most of these people in private equity now have multiple investments.

This is not a one-time investment that you'll own a Toronto Maple Leafs. You know, Rogers is a major company, major sports organization, but also a media company. And, you know, so at the end of the day, it comes down to, you know, do you have your hands on the wheel? And that said, every general manager or every team president in today's world has to manage up. They're managing down with their coaching staff and their players. They're managing up with the team president or the team owner. That's, it's not an issue solely in, you know, corporate situation. or individual ownership situations.

It is a staple of every professional sports team today. I'm glad you mentioned Rogers there because even whether they have a hand on the wheel, the Toronto Maple Leafs, and by the end of this year, the MLSE will be 100% owned by Rogers. The very fact that they are also a media company, does that not then, by its very definition,

lead to the expectation with Rogers entering another multi or 12 year, multi-billion dollar contract with the NHL, the media side of things doesn't want to enter this multi-billion dollar relationship with a rebuilding cash cow. So does that not necessitate that like, listen, for the first five years, this team is not going to rebuild, thank you very much, because they would like a return on investment. They've just spent multi-billion dollars on this deal with the NHL. they're not interested in a rebuild. So even just the very presence of Rogers there,

does that not hank off a manager that might say, you know what? We want a rebuild. Well, too bad. We want ratings and revenue in the playoffs. Here's the way that I framed it the other day, Anton. When John Ferguson ran the Toronto Maple Leafs, every year he would submit a budget.

Actually, I have to submit two. they would submit two budgets to the board through Richard Petty. One that accounted for playoff revenue. This is when the Ontario Teachers pension owned the team. And the other accounted for a rebuild. That was always a preferred one from Ferguson. But the board always approved the one that accounted for a playoff revenue so they could get their return on investment. I remember talking to Ferguson about this once.

And he said, yeah, my greatest disappointment was, you know, everyone would say like, oh, you submitted the budget. you submitted the budget, but you never asked how many budgets I had to submit. And the answer was two. The fact that this is all owned by Rogers, I can't see them saying, you know what? It's rebill time. It's going to be three to five years of pain. Okay. Well, I'm going to take the contrary position.

Okay. Because on a 12-year deal, the number of playoff rounds that the Leafs are going to play in the playoffs is the most important factor. Not how many they're going to play in the first two or three years. And this retool rebuild situation needs to be successful. And if you take the approach that us making the playoffs for the next two years, and right now, the Leafs are not making the playoffs with the roster that they have. So they need to improve to make the playoffs. And as I think you and I either discussed or had a text exchange. I'm trying to figure out even if they improve over the next few years,

what teams are going to get worse that are going to allow them to make the playoffs with an aging Willie Neelander, an aging Austin Matthews, a super aging Johnny Tavares, an aging Riley, and the rest of the cast that they have right now, which aren't necessarily playoff-bound players, and their goaltending that is very average. So if the goal is simply that win enough to make it into the 16th spot in the league,

they can probably do that. And they'll get knocked out in the first round, which they have a history of doing, as we all know. And that'll be it. So Rodgers will get one round out of the Leafs every year. Rogers shouldn't want one round out of the Leafs. They should want four rounds out of the Leafs, okay, which means going to the Stanley Cup

if not winning it. And to do that, I don't see the structure of this roster as doing that. They may not get in the playoffs, let alone win the Stanley Cup, when they're now facing a rejuvenated Montreal Canadians, Ottawa Senators, Buffalo Sabres, potentially if the can get its act together, the Detroit Red Wings. And then you have Tampa that doesn't appear to want to go anywhere with John Carter. The Bruins are hanging in there. Panthers will be back.

Yeah, and the Panthers will be back. So at the end of the day, what makes anybody believe that this is a retool rather than a rebuild when you don't have a bunch of great hockey players, you don't have any draft picks, and you don't have anybody in the minors or previous draft picks that are, you know, ranked in the top 50 to 75 as future prospects. It's, that's mind bogging to me, but the Leafs have, you know, they can do what they want. But I'd want to win the championship, not just make the playoffs. If I'm Rogers executives, not with the Leafs, but with Rogers media and entertainment. and I want people getting clicks on their cell phones and watching Rogers TV and making money from the media company.

If the Leafs make the playoffs, what do they generate? $10 million? That's peanuts. Like, with all due respect, $10 million in revenue for Rogers in the overall Rogers Empire? Yep. It's peanuts. Trump change. Okay.

How do you see New Jersey and Nashville? this Maple Leaf situation. How do you see these two? First of all, one more backup here on Toronto, actually. Because there have been a lot of takes on this one. Everybody has an opinion on it. I understand it, even though it has already happened with other teams. When it happens in Toronto, it's always a big deal.

Thoughts on Keith Pelley securing PBI. Now, that's Neil Glassberg's company to do an executive search for the general manager, perhaps president of hockey operations as well. well. Now, Neil has been hired through and his firm have been hired to do this before, Vancouver with Rutherford, Anaheim as well. It's what one of the things that his company does. Do you have a thought on that? For those that think that that is a major deal or a conflict of interest because he does represent coaches and managers, is it the big deal that some are making out or ultimately the final decision rests on Keith Pelley and MLS?

so it doesn't matter how they get there. Well, I think what it comes down to in my mind is what influence that Neil Glassberg and PBI and the coach's agency is going to have. You know, I've heard a lot of hockey talking heads say, well, he's not really going to be doing anything. He's not going to be given any authority to make any decisions and so on and so forth. My question to that is actually, so why are you hiring him? Like, what's he doing?

The whole hockey world will be knocking on Neil Glassburg or Keith Pelley's or whoever's door that Keith Pelley authorizes to do the search. And what value is Neil going to bring to the table? And don't get me wrong, Neil's a bright guy. But he has an conflict of interest by representing a number of people that are going to be looking to have this job. So how is he going to be unbiased? and what is that bias going to impact when that decision making takes place? And if he's that important to the process that he's been hired by Keith Pelly, then I would think that Keith Pelley is trusting his judgment in a lot of different situations,

but his judgment is tainted. That's my assessment. I mean, there's a, there's a, there's a few things in this one to play. I keep going back to, you know, the thought that if I was, if I was a client and I didn't get the judge, or at least an interview through all of this. Sure. Anyhow, I look at it from that point of view. Oh, there's a lot of issues.

And to me, it's, you know, Keith Pelly's got to decide who he trusts. He's got four assistant general managers that he hasn't fired yet. And there might be one person among those four that is qualified for the job. And the other three may or may not be qualified, but they're good hockey people. And they might be able to help you assess. I'm not quite sure that an executive search firm really. as that much to the deep layered understanding of what a general manager needs to do unless you've been in that room and agents aren't in that room. Cynically, I throw this out there.

How many prospective managers now are rebranding themselves as data-centric? Every one of them. Are you kidding me? If I was fine for the job, I'd be data-centric as well. I'd be Mr. Analytics. I was my first, as soon as Pelley said that, I'm like, oh, here comes everybody's rebrand. Listen, every one of those guys has pulled out their grade school high school marks. Yes.

And sent them on to Keith Pelley. Look, I got a 92 in algebra. Yeah, look. I'm good. And Jeff, analytics is part of the game. And you and I've had this. I think analytics has always been part of the game. But we haven't just indiced it to the point where we've actually put it on spreadsheets.

And Scotty Bowman and Punch Himlack and all the old school guys, they used analytics. But they use it in their head. Okay. They need a spreadsheet to understand who won puck battles. They watched the game and they saw who won puck battles. Okay. And the reality of it is analytics is great. It's a tool in the toolbox.

The talent that you want from a general manager is not to understand analytics because I don't think there's a general manager right now worth his weight and salt that doesn't understand analytics. It's actually having the analytics and then making the right decision. Analytics don't make the right decision. Okay. Keith Pelly basically said when you have all the facts, the decision is obvious and it makes, the decision makes itself. No, it doesn't. There's always variables to this. And the variables and assessing those variables that are in front of you, because if you're looking at a sheet of paper and you think that sheet of paper has given you the answer, you're in the wrong business. Sports is not just an analytics business. It's a touch and feel and decision making because there's certain things

that are not quantifiable. All it is is a way to measure the game. Like I look back, just as a quick detour here, I've spent a lot of time at the Hockey Hall of Fame Resource Center and looking at old game sheets. And written on the earliest game sheets that we have in the NHL, written on some of them are a reminder for the official score to make sure to add assists,

to goals to give a better snapshot of what led up to that goal. Now the pushback back then was what does it matter who touched the puck before the goal went in? All we care about was who scored the goal. But the thinking behind it was no, that is not an event that exists in a vacuum. There are things around that goal that led up to it, which is why I always go back to the first analytic in hockey was assists. and that goes back to 18, 19, when they first started introducing it.

All it is is a way to measure an event. That's it. Well, it might have been goals, actually. Well, I mean, the goal is like the thing and the part in the pump, but the goal of the game, but everything around that goal that led to it that at the time

wasn't obvious to people because a lot of people that pushed back and said, who cares who touched the puck? This guy shot it in. That's all that matters. And then you realize, no, it's not.

It's the things around that event. that led to that guy putting the round thing over the red line. New Jersey and Nashville, how do you see, as a couple of moments left with you here, how do you see these two processes shaking themselves out, two different ownership setups, two different types of owners as well? How do you see these two working out? Well, if you go to Nashville, I think it's going to be very interesting because my understanding is that Nick Saban has a big hand in the process there as a part owner with Mr. Haslam.

And Nick, Nick Saban's brilliant. I would love to be a fly on the wall if Nick Saban is interviewing NHL general manager prospects, because I don't think he would suffer fools gladly. So if you're going in there, you better have a real good understanding of the Nashville Predators and the League because he's top-notch in terms of understanding sports and motivation and how to achieve success, both in sports and in business. And I'd be surprised if anybody walks in there and blows him away by spouting analytics and all the stuff that the media like to talk about right now.

As for New Jersey? New Jersey is going to be an interesting situation because they've got a lot of talent. They're, you know, they've, they've struggled in the last few years with a variety of different things. And I don't know whether it's a culture aspect or they just can't seem to put the pieces of the puzzle into a whole unit. As you would recall a few years ago when New Jersey was. struggling. It was always the goal tending, right? Their goaltending. Everything else was great. Yes. Everything else was great. Just get a save. Yes. Yeah. Just get a save and they went out and got Markstrom. So now they're getting some saves

and they can't figure out their defense, right? And, you know, they've got too many defensemen or they don't have enough healthy defensemen. They've got to move Simone Nemich or they've got to move Dougie Hamilton. And I think that that causes dysfunction when you're not quite sure what direction you're going in. And then you've got, and I think the Hughes family are wonderful people. I just wonder how much the Luke Hughes contract and the dollar amount that he got at a point in time when he hasn't really shown that maybe he deserves that dollar amount impacts the room. okay, because you have other guys that are in there. We've heard that. We've heard that.

I don't think that's controversial. We've all heard that. Yeah. And listen, every member of the Hughes family I've met is a wonderful person in and among themselves. But I think the contract itself may have been a little bit divisive. And listen, the league is,

you know, we talk about parity. You know, you've just got to look at the standings right. now. Okay. And the devils are probably underachieving. There are certain teams that are overachieving. But when you have basically about eight teams that are within six points of the playoffs at this time of the year that still have a playoff shot, you've got to perform every night. And if there's dysfunction in the room, you don't succeed. Just look at Buffalo. Somehow,

and this has nothing, I don't think this has anything to do with Kevin Adams, but, you know, pre-November or whatever that date is to now. And it's not just drinking beer at the anchor bar that changed it. It's a culture thing. No, Razdalen said they started drinking beer together. This is like the Bruins of this early 70s. Come on. I'll tell you all.

That's part of it. Okay, because you've got to find something that unites your team that has everybody in the fight. And sometimes that's a fight on the ice. Sometimes that's a team meeting. Sometimes that's a new general manager coming in and refocusing the team, which Yarmor, I think, did. And it's going to be interesting because you've got a team that I think everybody thought was on a par with the Montreal Canadians and the Ottawa Senators and the Buffalo Sabres in the Detroit Red Wings. They haven't found that yet. okay i don't know whether they got to go you know have a dressing room brawl or or drinking

beer somewhere in greptown or whatever but they've got a bunch of guys that just don't to show up for each other and somebody's got to figure it out there that one is a that one's a fascinating one and i've been telling people the line that i got whenever i check in on you know how safe is eisen through all this the eyes are planted all that the line that I keep hearing back, Anton, is Chris is not Mike. Steve is fine. Chris is not Mike Illich. Chris Illich is not Mike Illich.

That at least for one more season, Steve Eisenman seems to be fine. Let me personalize something here before you, before I let you go, because I am always curious about this. We talked about Kent Hughes earlier, and that is an agent-turned-general manager. That's not new in the NHL. Like, you know, Brian Burke, who's on week. Like, Berkey was an agent. Like there have been a lot of agents that have gone on to run NHL teams.

Two things. What is it that agents have that make them attractive? I guess the other thing now is there certainly some agents right now that probably can't take the pay cuts if they wanted to go on to become a general editor because of how I don't think of a couple. I can think of a couple that I can take the pay cut right now. Yeah, there's a couple. Okay. So what do agents have that make? them attractive to NHL teams to run the franchises.

And two, have any teams ever approached you? I've never asked you that. Any teams ever approached to you? Sure. Well, in terms of agents, I think, and we're talking senior agents now, right? We're not talking the young agents that are just getting into the business. We're talking about guys that have 30 or 40 years of experience. Negotiating contracts, dealing with clients, understanding the wants and needs of those clients,

understanding when what happens when players get called up and get called down or sent down. And so you've got a very, very fundamental understanding of the business of the sport, both from the dollars and cents standpoint and from the player standpoint and from the just general notion of how to manage people. You're managing, if you're with one of the larger agencies, you're also managing people. So you've got a management team, and it's no different than managing your assistant general managers or your scouting staff. And if you've been in the business for 30 or 40 years, all the people that the general managers interact with, the agents interact with as well. So we know all the people who are in scouting at the amateur level and the professional level.

We know all the assistant general managers. So we're part of that network. And depending on the job, again, I think, in. In Kent Hughes' case, it was an easy transition into Montreal because he had a great support system around him. Jeff Gordon and Johnny Sedgwick, and here's the role that we need from you, Kent, and it fit perfect with Kent's personalities. To answer your second question, nobody's knocking on my door, Jeff.

But going back as far as, I think it was in the early 90s when Neil Smith, when Neil Smith was hired. With the Rangers? General manager with the Rangers. You know, I was offered an assistant general manager position way back when, made the decision not to take it for a variety of reasons. I had a very young family. My daughters are now under 30s, but we only had one daughter who was probably six

months old at the time. Right. My wife was from Toronto. And quite honestly, it was at that point in time that my agency was starting to take off. And I didn't want to leave players like Mike Ritchie and Drake Barahowski and others who I had done a great job of recruiting against some of the bigwigs here in Toronto. And I wanted to sort of see that through. Plus, there was enough money to get me to move to New York. Well, and that's it.

That's it. Again, like to the previous, you couldn't take the pay cut. And you had to make your appearances on primetime sports. I used to watch and listen to you all the time. And I was still practicing a lot of time too. Yeah. Oh, are you? Okay.

I'm a lawyer at the time as well, yeah. So I would have had to have left all that. And my wife's family is from Toronto as well. So a tough decision, but it is what it is. But even at the minor hockey level, like you were one of, if not the person, to help put together the AAA program for OMHA. I was involved in that. Very influential at the minor youth hockey level.

He probably deserves most of the credit for that. But yeah, I was involved in some of that. You've worn a number of hats, my friend. Thanks for stopping by on the program today. Always a delight catching up. Always a pleasure. And if anybody wants to call me but a job, just give him my number. There you go.

If the Rangers are still interested, you know. Yeah, you never know. There you go. I can move to New York now. Chris Dree. That's right. I can afford it now. Thanks, pal.

You'd be good. Take care.